


The Raven Races

by our_winter



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-07-18
Updated: 2015-07-22
Packaged: 2018-04-09 23:15:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,431
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4368062
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/our_winter/pseuds/our_winter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It is the first day of November and so, today, someone will die.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**SEVEN YEARS AGO**

It is the first day of November and so, today, someone will die.

It’s never safe here. The sands are the deadliest place in this deadly island.

The wind is whipping Ronan’s cheekbones, throwing salt and sand on his face. The sky is deep blue, the cliff is white and the sea is blue, black and brown. He went down the cliff beside his dad, the boy could hear the sea sings calling the horses and the men. More he gets close to the beach, more he can see the horses. In the shining sun they glow the same color of the beach’s gravel: white, black, red, grey, blue, gold, ivory. The _capaill uisce_ are death, they will tear a man apart and yet the man still will be enchanted with them.

Ronan is surrounded by water horses, the men adorn their horses with red ribbons, flowers and iron chains, trying to protect their own lives with enchantments. You can adorn them as much as you want, hide them from the sea, this will not keep them from killing you.

The boy can feel the _capaill_ energy, the hooves hitting the sands with force and purpose. They want to run and they want to kill, it’s on their blood, it’s what they are, they are not a docile pureblood, they will not gently push you with their heads or nib slightly your arm, they will cut your hand off and smash your skull. Ronan can’t say who is going to die today, maybe the man on the blue horse back or the one on the red’s. Niall Lynch is like he always is, with an easy smile on his lips and sure steps. They stop in a safe distance from the sea, away from most of the others competitors, Chainsaw is restless, pushing against the reins, her black head turning towards the sea, her ears almost touching her black neck.

“Go grabby the saddlecloth and armband for me.”

Ronan shakes his head and walks through the pummeled sands, the officials are seated in a stand far away from where the horses are prancing and kicking.

“Lynch.”

The official nods and gives Ronan a blue bunch of fabric. They don’t need to ask who he is, since he was six his father would bring Ronan with him, Declan don’t like to come and Matthew is too young, they stay on the top of the cliff watching with their mother and the others spectators. His father gives him the mare’s reins when he comes back putting the armband on his upper arm, he lifts his small saddle to adjust the cloth and Ronan can read the words burned in the leather. _Our dead drink the sea._

The boy leans forward whispering in the black mare ear while drawing a counterclockwise circle above her eye.

“Wanna lose a peace of this pretty face of yours Ronan?”

Ronan ignores his father words and leans back whispering in Chainsaw’s ear, the mare’s black eyes are fixed on the small boy now.

“Don’t eat my father.”

He places his lips beside her head, the mare shakes her head towards the sea, smashing her hooves against the already battered sand. She’s shaking with energy, burning to run. Ronan can feel it where his hands touch her ebony fur. He had ride her before, he knows what it’s like to feel the powerful muscles beneath him, her breaths against his thighs, her long mane against his cheeks, the way she tends more to her left side, the sea singing to them both. She will be not easy to control today but it’s a race day, all the horses are restless today, if a _capall_ is deadly every day of the year they are deadlier on this day. Today the sands and the sea will end red with blood.

Ronan wish he could race, he wants to be the one to pass the finish line riding Chainsaw. He wants to be there, in the middle of the blood, neighs, teeth, hooves, screams and speed. He wants to know how it feels like to lose himself in the war that happens in the sands. _More five years._ He remembers himself, you need to be fifteen to register.

Niall places a hand on his shoulder.

“Ready?”

The boy shakes his head and the man leans forward to encircle his arms around his son.

“I’ll see you in the end of the race.”

“She will be the first.”

Niall messy Ronan’s black hair with a big smile before taking the reins and mounting up, the mare turns on her hooves, shaking her head, her eyes are fixed on the ocean once again. Ronan can hear its singing.

“Go stay with you mom, we are all going to eat November cakes after.”

Ronan smiles when his father winks at him and strides fast between the horses, the _capaill_ try to catch the back of his jacket when he passes them, the white teeth shining almost red in the sun, maybe they are red, maybe they had already eat a part of someone. The boy climbs his way back the top of the cliff, striding between the eager audiences that comes every year from the continent to see The Raven Races. Aurora is waiting for him with an angel’s smile and a mug of hot chocolate, she pats the cushion beside her giving Ronan a kiss on the forehead when he sits.

“She will be fast?”

Matthew asks in his infant voice, his blue eyes shining happily. Ronan smiles back at his little brother.

“Faster than all of them.”

Declan stay with his eyes trained on the competitors, analyzing, always analyzing. Ronan hear they start to count, his eyes in the black mare with a stain of blue on her back. The poles are lift and the horses run forward. It’s a hunt, they’re all predators there, the water horses try to clenches their teeth on their neighbors, try to drops the riders and go to the ocean. His father is the first on the line when the gold capall catches his arm, Niall Lynch is pulled off the _uisce_ mare and throw to the sands, Chainsaw runs to the ocean, a dozen hooves trample his father body, Aurora’s scream eco through the beach. 


	2. Chapter 2

Adam doesn’t know why he loves this island, but he does. He had seen people climbing up the boats to try their luck in the continent, he had even imagined himself as one of them, going to try the undiscovered, the mere thought made him feel dizzy. He’s a part of Thisby, his hair is the same color as the island dirty, his eyes the shade of the ocean in a storm day, his stubbornness as hard as the rocks.

He watches calmly as the family climbs the boat down in the pier. The kids and the mother tremble probably fearing the sea, it’s too close from November, the waters are less safe than ever, not that it is very safe in any month of the year but it’s just stupidity travelling now. Adam was at Blue’s mother grocery when they had gone there the day before to buy provisions for the two days travel, and he heard the mother complain about her husband absurd idea of going to the continent, the boy just thought that if she doesn’t want to go, she just should stay with the kids and let him go alone, but he kept his mouth shut and finished buying the news brooms for the hotel. Now while he uses the same broom to sweep the hotel’s front he watches the woman sits in the boat and hug tightly her children’s.

“Parrish I don’t pay you to stay there like a statue, goes find something to do!”

Adam just nods at Jacob’s words and enters the hotel. There’s not much to do now, the hotel stays empty most of the year, it’s just when the races start that the tourists starts to arrive and fill the rooms and halls. Skarmouth and the rest of the island are almost dead the entire year; Adam knows people train the horses; knows they sell a small bunch of animals to the continent; that Maura buy and sold very few things; that the only hostages out of season that enters the hotel are here to buy horses. It’s the only thing that seems to really matter in this island. The killer horses. The boy should be relieved to could keep at least his job at Skarmouth’s hotel the entire year, most of people couldn’t say the same. In the time of the races would surge a lot of jobs in every place, but in the monotony of the other months there was nothing to do, so Adam keeps his forces for the races time when he manages to twist between as many jobs as he can take.

 

 

***

 

 

He doesn’t need to wait much for his shift to end and if it were the week before the first day of November he would go to the bakery and help, but in the other monotonous eleven months of the year nothing happens in Thisby, except the people the _capaill_ kill occasionally. He ends up outside the bakery anyway waiting for Blue to finish her shift.

“Hey.”

She sits at his side on the pavement putting a sweet bread on his lap.

“Hey.”

Adam nibbles gently his bread looking at nothing in particular.

“What’s wrong?”

She’s pushing her short hair behind her ears, Adam smiles and leans forward to brush a stain of flour off her forehead.

“I’m going see the house tomorrow.”

Blue claps her hands happily, a big smile lighting up her face.

“This is so good. We need to celebrate!”

She’s already on her feet and going down the street, her dress made from four different dresses flowing behind her, Adam chuckles softly and stands to go after her.

“I don’t ever close the deal yet.”

“But you will, and we will have a lot of sleepovers.”

The door to 300 Fox Way Groceries and Psychic swings open as Blue strides by it like a wild animal. Adam had tried to discover the reason behind the name but the women had given him multiple mismatched explanations and any of them explained anything. Like always. Adam walks through piles of various things, some of doesn’t even know what are, the air smells like incense and some of Maura’s crazy teas.

“Mom?”

Adam leans against the counter eating slowly his bread, the sweet making his fingers sticky. Looking around he starts to think about all the things he’ll have to buy in some days and the money he doesn’t have, he would ask Maura if he could pay her later, he already knows she would let him, but his pride will not. Adam could sleep on the hard floor before asking for help.

“Pain can be good.”

The boy almost jumps out of his skin when Persephone whispers behind him, making him turn around in a rush. Her eyes are vague, her long almost white hair is disheveled, like always, she’s wearing a long purple dress that have mud on hemline.

“What?”

Persephone blinks and smiles at him.

“Adam is so good to see you!”

“Er… You too.”

He answers awkwardly but she’s already climbing up the stairs to where they all live. Adam is convinced that are at least twenty women living up there. Blue come back from the back of the store with a frown.

“Mom’s not here.”

Adam shrugs finishing his bread and licking his fingers.

“She must be out finding new herbs to try on her teas.”

Blue’s shoulders falls a little, Adam knows she wants everybody to be there to celebrate, even if nobody knows the real reason for him to be moving out, he gives her a smile, it’s really easy to smile today.

“We can celebrate tomorrow after I go see the house, ok?”

“Ok, good luck.”

She gives a peck on his cheek before Adam goes out the store, the sun is just starting to go down coloring the sky in orange and blue. Adam’s feet’s already know where to go even before he knows to where he is going.

The city is small, the paving a little wet from last night rain, Adam doesn’t like raining days, the thunders couldn’t let him hear his father’s steps on the wood of their house floor. Soon enough the stones give place to the grass and the boy strides between the pastures to his favorite spot on the cliff. The boy sits on the rock and looks at the sea; the almost lullaby way the waves comes to hit the sea, lazily and quiet; the wind swirls violently around him, disheveling his sandy hair and throwing the longer strands into his eyes; his fingers are becoming numb from the cold but he doesn’t care. He’s happy. He’s so fucking happy. Tomorrow he would be closing the deal and getting out his house. His father will not be gone but he will have at least a lock between the two of them. Adam laughs relieved, he laughs till tears run down his face and his shoulders shake, and he doesn’t even know if he is laughing anymore but he doesn’t care.

He hears it before he sees it. A loud neigh, the sound of hooves smashing dirty. Then he sees it. The horse is running past away from him; the red fur shining in the setting sun; his nostrils wide open with the force to keep pushing air; the mane flying on the face of his rider. The rider is a boy of Adam’s age, with shaved head and pale skin, his hands firm and steady in the reins, his thighs tightly pressed against the horse’s ribs. The boy doesn’t give Adam a glance while he passes him, riding in the back of the stallion and he just follows the rider till he disappears. Adam turns back to stare at the sea.

 

 

***

 

 

The lights are already lit when he enters his house, Adam lets his smile and eyes drop the moment the door swings open but there’s no one near to be seen, his father must be taking another whisky bottle from the kitchen, some days they don’t even had what to eat but they surely had alcohol in the counter. He walks as quietly as possible to his room mentally thanking Blue for the bread so he doesn’t need to eat. The moment he opens the door he knows something is terribly wrong. His father is sitting on a chair he had bring from the kitchen and the envelope Adam keeps his money is throw on top of his mattress.

“What is this Adam?”

His father voice is steady but he is already standing and this doesn’t means nothing good, Adam recoils against the wall.

“What the hell this means?”

Adam doesn’t know what to say, his father’s fists are already clenched, the boy could smell the whisky on his breath.

“I made you a fucking question, are you deaf?”

Adam should be prepared for this, still, the first hit take him completely off guard, all the air is push out of his lungs when his father’s fist hits his stomach, he gasps for air already bent in the middle.

“This is how grateful you are for everything I had done for you?”

Another hit.

“You are nothing boy. Nothing!”

Adam’s jaw crack with the next hit and he goes to the floor.

“I almost kill myself working to bring food home and this is the way you thanks me? Stealing from me?”

Robert starts kicking the boy’s ribs.

“I should have given you to one of those fucking horses to eat. You are useless. A fucking piece of shit!”

Adam’s mouth is filled with blood, he’s entire body shaking. He thinks about Persephone’s words and tries to find something good in the pain. He can’t.


	3. Chapter 3

_Ronan is shaking, he’s wet and cold, and haven’t slept properly in months, every time he tries he wakes with a scream trapped in his throat and his father’s name on his lips. He had come to his spot on the beach as he had come every storm night since he had lost everything. Today is not different, he sits shaking on the rock, the cold seems to penetrate his skin like needles, his toes are numb into his boots._

_He almost misses her amongst the rain and darkness,_ almost. _She walks down the beach in her long white nightdress; her golden hair plastered against her cheeks and shoulders; it’s almost like she’s in some kind of trance, a ghost of a haunted soul. Ronan doesn’t see her in the rain till her bare feet are in the water, eyes closed and face tilted to the sky, she whispers something to the sea and the sea answer in the form of a white capall uisce coming out the waves. The boy is already halfway to her screaming her name, she doesn’t hear him, the woman’s eyes fixed in the white death that strides to her; Ronan’s tears mix with the rain, his throat is raw from screaming her name._

 _The end happens in a blink. In one moment Aurora is motionless there and in the other the capall in dragging her into the black waters. She doesn’t scream she doesn’t make a sound. It’s only the rain, the furious waves and the thunders. Ronan bent to his knees in the sand, his body trembling he doesn’t even know more from what._ Take me. Take me. _He whispers to the sea. Nothing happens for a moment and then the white capall comes back, the beast walks slowly towards him, he doesn’t even know any more if he should be relieved or scared, the horse stops in the front of him, his black eyes seems like the ocean floor, the end of hope, like death; the capall looks right into Ronan’s eyes and bent down, he bites the boy’s right wrist, tasting his flesh and blood, and then leaving him there alone and bleeding._

Ronan sits up gasping; his hand going automatically to his wrist where he finds the familiar five leather bands; his back is sore from the long hours lying on the hard pew; he blinks to the dark church only illuminated for a few candles lit on the altar; the boy runs his hand for his shaved head with a sigh. Ronan should be used to it by now. He doesn’t dream anymore. Only two things can happen when he closes his eyes: he blacks out or he has nightmares. He gets up taking the empty bottle beside the pew and strides out of the church, the night air is cold and he shoves his shiver out of his shoulders, it must be almost sunrise. The red stallion is waiting exactly where Ronan had let him: hidden in the church’s stall. He runs his hand through the horse back murmuring softly, his breath forming clouds in the air while adjusting the blanket over the horse and tightening the saddle, the red stallion chews the bridle when Ronan slides it back into his mouth.

The boy’s body settles easily on the saddle, the chill air running past them while the horse strides through the dirt road, Ronan doesn’t even need to open his eyes to know his path, he had walked it his entire life, still, he can’t stop himself from looking at the things that make Thisby what it is. The rocks, the hard ground that turns almost impossible to plant anything, the sheep, the wind, the sound of the sea. He is bound to this island like to his own bones.

The farm is not far from the city and soon enough Ronan can see the barns against the dawning sun, the wood board carved “The Barns” is hanging from a tree since his family had bought the farm generations before, Ronan has no idea how long that had been. The horses head rises and turns to him when he opens the door, he hears a familiar neigh from the end of the stalls and he whistles to let her know he’s home; the men’s are already working and feeding the horses, they nod while Ronan strides to Imperator’s stall. Gansey is coming from the house tapping his cane in the dirty, his dark glasses hanging low on his nose, Ronan strides to Chainsaw’s stall and caress her forehead with the tips of his fingers.

“Here you are.”

How the man is able to know exactly every time where Ronan is, is beyond his understanding. He keeps an eye to keep the blind man away from the _capall’s_ mare teeth, although her head is already buried in the crook of Ronan’s arm. He holds an iron piece in his pocket anyway.

“Looking for me Dick?”

Gansey scowls at him, the smell of mint coming from him in waves.

“Don’t call me that.” When Ronan just keeps scratching the mare’s ear he let out a sigh. “You know today three customers are coming and the tenants will start to arrive soon.

It’s Ronan’s time to scowl.

“I already told you I will not sit and play the babysitter.”

“I’m not asking you to.”

“They are just stupid rich men that come here looking for their deaths.”

“Your brothers are coming too.”

Ronan’s shoulders tense up instantly. He sees his brothers once every year, always in the race time. Declan had made the decision to move to the continent and took Matthew with him after their father and mother death. The older brother had tried to take Ronan with them but he could never leave the island, the only thing that keeps him alive is the race and the black mare inside the barn, if he let the sea magic behind he doesn’t know what of him would be left.

Declan being the older had naturally took his father’s business even if he didn’t had a clue on what to do, he had never been good with horses or administration, he is good at convincing people to do what he want with a fake smile. So he brought Gansey from the continent to take care of the farm and promised Ronan to not sell it until he lose a race. Ronan had never lost a race. He gives Gansey his sharpest smile, even knowing he can’t see it but knowing he could catch the hint on his voice.

“They don’t come every year?”

 

 

***

 

 

The sun is high in the sky, the men in the fence look pleased with the sight of Imperator trotting around the corral, Gansey answers most of the men questions but some of them still ends landing on Ronan’s lap.

“What’s his relation with the _capaill_?”

The man who asks is the quietest of them all. He is tall and pale, with fair hair and has a smudge on the skin under his eye. Ronan had not cared to ask his name, he hadn’t asked none of their names. This men come here year after year to buy horses and put them to race in circles. Ronan had gone once to the continent with his father to see their races. They have whips, helmets, goggles, tiny men riding big horses. Ronan’s heart didn’t pound even once with enthusiasm. If that is the way the men live in the continent he doesn’t want to live there ever. There’s no emotion, no wild horses, no sea singing, there’s nothing more than a bunch of horses in a fast carrousel.

“Ronan.”

Gansey says remembering him that he doesn’t know the answer for that.

“He’s a fourth _capall_ and a sixth PSI.”

“His father won the race?” The black man ask.

“He was the last one to win.”

“I thought a mare won last year.” The oldest of them all ask while scratching his red beard.

“And the year before.” The black says again.

“He was the last to win before she started to win.”

Ronan keeps his eyes trained on the horse. His red fur shines in the sun, sweat starting to drain from his back, his smart dark brown eyes never leaving Ronan, his legs moving agile and elegant. The horse is almost a piece of art dancing in the red sands. Ronan is proud of him, proud of all the horses, of the way people would come from all the parts of the world to see and buy his horses. Gansey always keeps an eye, or better, an ear in the continent races and most of the time the winners’ names are familiar.

“I want to see a _capall._ ”

The red man says. Ronan stops Imperator with a click of his tongue, he takes the red horse inside and comes back with the bay stallion. Hunter is his name. Gansey said he can’t keep giving names like Chainsaw to the horses, but the _capaill_ are only his, doesn’t matter who rides them in the race.

“Keep your arms away from the fence.”

Gansey warns the moment Ronan closes the gate. Ronan gives the stallion halter and keeps the whip ready on his hand. The water horse start to trot, his hooves landing soft against the sand, almost soundless; he keeps his dark eyes in the men out of the fence, he doesn’t pay so much attention to Ronan, Ronan is familiar to him, as familiar as a drop of water and a drop of seawater can be; the whip swirls in the air with a slash and the stallion’s eyes fly back to the boy; he bares his teeth and lets out a breath that remembers Ronan very much of a scowl. He bares his teeth back in a smile and incites the horse with a click of his tongue. The _capall_ starts to run in a slow gallop, seawater dropping from his nose and eyes.

Ronan feel restless, so feels the horse. He keeps changing the halter on his hand, his teeth biting the inside of his cheek, his toes curling inside his boots. He can hear and feel the sea singing, its magic calling him, wanting to take him, the scar on his wrist burn like an open wound hit by seawater. The horse hunches to him with bared teeth ready to take a piece of his flesh, the whip slash in the air. Today is the day the horses come out of the sea.


End file.
